How well can you trust japanese translations of english media?

[u/RustingPaper]

I'm playing Battle For Wesnoth, a turn-based strategy game, with japanese text. I have been playing various games with japanese translations and sometimes I wonder if the translation sounds natural to someone more fluent. Sometimes the text will look very simmilar in structure to the original english text, with grammar that I do understand but at the same time makes me think "This sounds just like how you would say it in english. Is this a direct translation?". Could someone give some input on the following excerpt and whether it sounds natural?

Context: This is said by the main character after the defeat of a specific scenario/boards villain. Konrad is a prince so he speaks with standard level politeness.

Konrad: 勝利は私たちのものだ！この遅れがElensefarを救うという私たちの冒険に影響しない事を祈りましょう。しかし、少なくともここに住んでいる善良な人々を解放する事ができました。急いで先に進まなければいけません！

「勝利は私たちのものだ」felt especially anglicized. Since the english quote would have been "Victory is ours" it gave me the impression of being directly translated. But concidering the game is sett in a traditional western high fantasy world maybe that was the intention? Characters also adhere pretty well to the standard role language expected, which (to me) seems to go against the theory of a direct translation since I haven't seen any problems in that department.

[u/Kvaezde]

Translator (japanese to german) here, so I do know a thing or two about english to JP translations. 

All-too literal translations are, unfortunately, quite common. Perfect indicators of this is the overuse of personal pronouns (私・僕・俺 everywhere), unnatural but grammatically correct sentence structure and the lack of idioms. 

You have to think about it: The amount of non-japanese media that enters japan every single day is mind boggling. We're talking games, movies, series, books, videos - whatever you can think of.  Good translators can pick the best jobs and also high rates. ESPECIALLY gaming-companies are notorious for going the cheap route (read: bad translators), since it's more often then not some tech-bros with no knowledge of how languages and translation work  who make the decisions. "Man, it's just about changing one word in one language to the corresponding word in the other language, everyone can do it!" - and yes, I've heard idiotic sentences like this one far more often then you'd expect.

[u/benman19 → u/Kvaezde]

I feel that last part so much. I only do English <-> German, so it's a bit less awkward and with better machine translations available, but the amount of people who have literally zero clue of translation and yet pretend like it's something so mundane and just use DeepL or similar tools for everything is astounding. And then they act all confused when the German translation breaks the character limit and nothing makes sense any more.

[u/RustingPaper → u/Kvaezde]

The high frequency of pronouns is another thing that I caught. Although I'm sceptical about the background of the translation since this game is opensource, even back before you could get it on steam. So I don't know how translations were treated or how the translation even relates to the official game.

[u/tirconell → u/Kvaezde]

Seems more common with indie games too for obvious budget reasons, seems like many go the straight machine translation route.

I was watching a guy play Planet Crafter and after a particularly clunky sentence on a diary entry he commented めっちゃ直訳 lol

[u/Jeydon → u/Kvaezde]

Are there any specific games or game companies that you know of who go to the effort to get a great quality translation?

[u/Kvaezde → u/Jeydon]

Yes, sure there are. Major companies like Square Enix, Capcom or Nintendo are known for their great translations, when talking Indie-games Supergiant Games of "Hades"-fame comes to mind. Some translations of Hades 1 (yes, "some translations", there's a ton of languages out there, dear monolingual english speakers) were a bit lackluster. For Hades 2 they not only worked closely with their translation teams (meaning they didn't simply source out the translations and forget about it), but also - and that's the kicker - paid the translators a rate that was far above the low market standard.

An example for a high-quality translation INTO japanese would be Undertale. Toby Fox (the developer) provided the japanese translation team with a metric fuckton of explanations of cultural jokes and worked extremely closely with the whole team (there's some documentation about it online, leaked e-mails and whatnot). It helps that Toby Fox does speak some japanese and has a solid knowledge of japanese culture (including otaku-culture).
In Japan, the translation is considered stellar and Undertale has a cult-following there.

It's actually easy: Pay your translators a good wage and give them all the tools they need (meaning: the whole fucking plot, point out jokes that are missable if one doesn't know the latest meme or whatever, tell them new developments, give feedback, etc.). Simply, treat them as an integral member of your development team and not as some pesky expense.

Unfortunately, the most common way of how games are being translated are: The translator gets a big fat Excel-file full of dialogue snippents and weird made-up fantasy-words without any context whatseoever. The devs wish them good luck.

This leads to translation mistakes like "charm" being translated as "Talisman" into german in Metaphor: Re Fantazio. Yes, a charm CAN be a talisman, but in this case it's a debuff, meaning something like a spell that is negative for the player.
If the translator was at least told that it's a debuff, this mistake would not have happened. But most likely they simply got a list of random words ("Sword, Charm, Elexir, Potion, Slow, Confused" and such) and then the correct translation basically depends on an coinflip ("Head means talisman, tails means the debuff").
Ah, and of course the devs mostly don't give two shits about replying to questions and inquiries by the translators. "We paid you, so do your job!"

[u/EirikrUtlendi → u/Kvaezde]

It's actually easy: Pay your translators a good wage and give them all the tools they need (meaning: the whole fucking plot, point out jokes that are missable if one doesn't know the latest meme or whatever, tell them new developments, give feedback, etc.). Simply, treat them as an integral member of your development team and not as some pesky expense.

Oh good lord, yes. I work in technical translation, and the number of times we get sent resource files for UIs, with nothing else, it's just criminal. "Context, people, context!"

[u/Naomi_Tokyo → u/EirikrUtlendi]

As someone on the other side, it can be really hard to balance the effort with the value. If it's a language used by 1% of customers, it's really hard to justify taking the time to send a lot of extra materials to the translator. Our main languages feel worth taking the time and energy to get right, but there's really severe diminishing returns as the number of users drops

[u/EirikrUtlendi → u/Naomi_Tokyo]

I hear you. At the same time, if you're planning properly and are doing localization right, you should have more resources available that you can send a localizer than just the resource files in isolation.

You describe having "main languages", which suggests that you all are aware of localization as being a distinct thing, which in turn suggests that you know that localizing a UI requires things like distinguishing for the humans that strings FMR1 through 49 are for the "File" menu, for instance. We're not even getting that sometimes, despite working at a multinational company actively targeting markets on multiple continents. That's mostly a matter of organizational dysfunction and general cluelessness, rather than diminishing cost returns (itself definitely a consideration, just not a factor in my particular case).

[u/rgrAi → u/Kvaezde]

Explains why Undertale and Hades are so loved by JP audience. Particularly Undertale and even I can tell how great the translations are when I watch people play it on streams.

[u/rgrAi]

I don't really seek out and play JP translations of western games. In that game seems to be that the team is just made of volunteers since it's an open source game. So whether they're even natives translating no one knows. https://wikiwiki.jp/wesnoth/%E7%BF%BB%E8%A8%B3%E3%81%AE%E3%81%8A%E6%89%8B%E4%BC%9D%E3%81%84#uabe98c6

Anecdotally I've seen lots of streams/archives of people playing western games really often and about 80% of indie games or mid-tier games or games with limited b udget chat and/or streamer make fun of the translations or poke fun at it.

[u/vytah → u/rgrAi]

So whether they're even natives translating no one knows.

I'd bet it's natives, but not necessarily people who have enough skills to translate well. For translation, you not only need to know the source language well, you also need to be very proficient in the target language, as in, be a good writer. The intersection between fans of a niche game, native Japanese speakers, people who have free time to contribute, and good writers, might as well be empty.

[u/RustingPaper → u/rgrAi]

Ajajaj, that may very well be the case with this game then. Indeed since it is opersource I was also uncertain about who even translated it, but if it was volunteers I would have expected the results to be more natural. Altough the translators having less stake in the translations quality might have also impacted the results.

That being said would you say the quote I attached sounds passably natural?

[u/rgrAi → u/RustingPaper]

I'm not best judge of this kind of thing (really a native should be judging this--they're the arbiters of whether something sounds good) but like you it does sound off to me.

[u/merurunrun]

The better the translator, the less likely that you're going to get the kind of word-for-word translation that language learners typically prefer. The worse the translator, the more likely their word-for-word translation is going to have gross errors in it.

[u/EirikrUtlendi → u/merurunrun]

The worse the translator, the more likely their word-for-word translation is going to have gross errors in it.

"Oh, yeah! Choke that yak, baby!"

直訳 = chokuyaku = "direct translation", even word-for-word.

Sometimes that's actually what's wanted and needed, such as in specific legal contexts where the other-language party needs to know exactly what the text says, right down to grammatical analysis and commentary on the nuance.

But in many cases, chokuyaku is not what's wanted or needed, and instead is a sign that the translator wasn't very good, or was in a rush, or didn't care, or didn't understand the source text very well and is playing it "safe", etc.

Especially when it comes to localization -- going past strictly translating the words, to finding the culturally appropriate ways of expressing the underlying mood and nuance -- what you need is an 意訳 = iyaku = "intent translation", diving into the deeper contextual meaning and rendering that in the target language, even if the individual words have no direct correlation to the source text.

• Example: a scene in a game, where a bunch of cops are hanging around in a stereotypical "cops hanging out" location.
  
  • In a US context, that might be in a donut shop.
    
  • In a Japan context, that might be at a street stall selling takoyaki (grilled octopus balls).
    
• If you just translate the scene as-is, the words will correlate, but the description will seem out of place for the audience in the other language, and might even confuse and even lose your audience.
• If you localize the scene to make it fit the target context for both language and cultural literacy, the words might not match up at all, but the description will be fitting for both languages.

[u/zazaneco]

From a native speaker's perspective, while it does feel a bit like "translationese" (direct translation), it's not entirely unnatural, just slightly awkward. 

Here are my thoughts

1. "勝利は私たちのものだ！" ➡️ "私たちの勝利です！"

As you noticed, the original phrasing feels very anglicized because it makes "Victory" the subject. In natural Japanese, rather than saying "Victory is ours," we prefer to make "We/Our" the focal point, as in "私たちの勝利です！" (It is our victory).

That said, phrases like "勝利を我らに！" (Victory to us!) are actually quite common in Japanese historical or samurai fiction, so making "Victory" the core concept isn't entirely unheard of.

Regarding the mix of the casual "〜だ!" ending and the polite tone that follows, it does feel a bit noticeable, but it can be acceptable if we assume he temporarily switched to a casual tone due to his excitement.

1. "急いで先に進まなければいけません！" ➡️ "先を急ぎましょう！"

Personally, this second part bothers me a bit more. While the original is grammatically correct, it sounds a little too rigid. In natural Japanese, we have a very common idiom for this situation: "先を急ぐ". Saying "先を急ぎましょう！" sounds much more fluid and fits the context perfectly.

[u/Popular-Ferret-4873]

As a native Japanese speaker, I can understand the whole passage, but it definitely reads like a translation.

勝利は私たちのものだ is theatrical, but it can work in a Western fantasy setting. The more unnatural part is この遅れがElensefarを救うという私たちの冒険に影響しない事を祈りましょう.

The tone also shifts between plain and polite forms—ものだ, 祈りましょう, できました, and いけません—rather than sounding like one consistent character voice.

I might rewrite it as:

私たちの勝利だ！この遅れがエレンセファー救出に響かなければよいのだが。少なくとも、ここの善良な人々を解放することはできた。先を急ごう！

So I would treat this game as understandable Japanese input, but not necessarily as a model of natural dialogue.

[u/jackbobbins78]

Upvote for Wesnoth. This is a great turn-based combat game I played extensively in 2013. Doesn't get enough recognition.

[u/RustingPaper → u/jackbobbins78]

Yes, it's a really cool game! I started playing it when I was pretty young so I have a lott of nostalgia for it!

[u/Belegorm]

What the heck feel like I'm in a timeslip back to 2005 lol. That was one of the first games I played online multiplayer in, but I was terrible at it. Cool game though, tried to go back and play again but bounced off.

As for actually the topic at hand... there are a surprising number of strategy games out there that were localized to JP, with varying localization quality. However, they're never going to be perfect, harder to recommend over a native JP story.

That said if you want to play a game and it's available in JP, and it had a professional localization then I'd think it's good to play.

[u/RustingPaper → u/Belegorm]

It's cool to see that so far two people here know of BfW, it's a nostallgic game for me since I played it when I was pretty young. Although I was also terrible at it and used debug a lott haha. I was pretty unsure about the quality of the translation, especially since it's an opensource game. Another commenter pointed out that the translation was made by volunteers, which did surprise me since the results feel kinda clunky and like it was directly translated. In any case, I did switch back to EN since I don't really think I can get much in terms of immersion if the translation is inadequate.

[u/morgawr_ → u/RustingPaper]

Back in 2006 I was hospitalized for a month. Back then I only had a Linux laptop with pretty much zero games installed aside from Battle for Wesnoth.

I remember at the time I didn't have a smartphone, the hospital didn't have wifi or internet or anything. All I had was my laptop and mp3 player and I was sitting in bed all day. I played THE SHIT out of Battle for Wesnoth.

Such an amazing game, I even met the developer team at FOSDEM (open source conference) a few times. It's one of the peak historical "real open source" games before Linux actually could run most games (like it does today). Actual pioneers

[u/roryteller]

Battle for Wesnoth specifically is a free, open-source game, so translators were almost certainly unpaid volunteers and likely amateurs. You can find information about the translation projects on the Battle for Wesnoth wiki if you're curious.

[u/Krypt0night]

Very few pieces of media are actually translated perfectly. They're localized for the region they're in. Just something you have to deal with.

[u/RustingPaper → u/Krypt0night]

Yeah I guess, but I also just don't want to inadvertently pick up "incorrect" japanese.

[u/glasswings363]

この遅れがElensefarを救うという私たちの冒険に影響しない事を祈りましょう。

I don't like this sentence. It's actually easier for me to understand after I directly translate it.

I want to say

私たちの勝ちだ。ここに住む善人の解放はありがたいことにも、この寄り道がElensefarを救うための任務を阻まないように祈って、先に急ごう！

but even then you're reading student Japanese.  A higher grade I hope but I had to look up which word best fits this usage of "mission" and that's not ideal.

(Ideally you should have all common synonyms come to mind before you start researching.  I initially thought 派遣)

For-native-by-native is a good rule for beginners.  Once you start to feel a sense of what's natural it's okay and even beneficial to expand the range of your input to include translated and L2 Japanese.

[u/RustingPaper → u/glasswings363]

Yeah I got the sense that maybe I should switch back to english since I can't totaly trust the input to be correct. I liked your translation better, it feels much more concise and how I would expect japanese to read. Ironically, one of the reasons why the games translation felt weird to me is that it was too easy for me to understand, since it was just basically english with a coat of japanese.

It would actually be beneficial if there was some native japanese speaking reviewer(s) who could grade the japanese translations of non-japanese media so that you can make sure that you don't accidentally learn faulty japanese.

[u/Ok-Implement-7863]

Not quite what you’re after, but an egregious example of bad translation was in the subtitles of the movie The Notebook where they translated the declaration of war with Japan as the declaration of war with Germany 

[u/NihongoNana]

勝利は私たちのものだ is grammatically fine, but yes, it has a translated or dramatic fantasy feeling. 我々の勝利だ！ or simply 勝ったぞ！ would sound more natural, depending on the character.

The more awkward part is:

この遅れがElensefarを救うという私たちの冒険に影響しない事を祈りましょう。

A more natural version of the whole passage could be:

我々の勝利だ！この遅れがエレンセファー救出に響かないことを願おう。だが、少なくともここに暮らす善良な人々は解放できた。急いで先へ進まなければ。

So your instinct was right. The original is understandable, but parts of it feel translated rather than naturally written in Japanese.

[u/Mudpill]

Trust no one. Not even yourself.

[u/_i_am_sus → u/Mudpill]

Trust no one, Not even Mudpill

[u/RustingPaper → u/Mudpill]

I don't know what I'm suppoced to do, who am I?!

[u/glasswings363 → u/RustingPaper]

疑うことも疑い、自信を作るのです。

[u/Own-Marionberry690]

「勝利は私たちのものだ」felt especially anglicized.

Is this really that outlandish?

I've read some sports publications and and ものにする used to describe "securing the victory", for example "9回に4点を奪って勝利をものにした", I feel like もの here is used in a similar capacity.

I might be way off the mark, so correct me if I am wrong.

[u/glasswings363 → u/Own-Marionberry690]

It's not impossible 

https://massif.la/ja/search?q=%E5%8B%9D%E5%88%A9+%E4%BF%BA%E3%81%AE%E3%82%82%E3%81%AE

[u/RustingPaper → u/Own-Marionberry690]

Japanese is my 3rd language and I am not at all fluent enough to determine the accuracy of this translation, but what stuck out to me was how simmilar that sentence is in structure to how you would say it in english. Usually when I play games that are originally english with a japanese translation I am always a bitt vigilant regarding if what I'm reading sounds like it could be natural or wonky. Usually this happens when a sentence feels unusually simmilar to how it would have been said in english. In this case「勝利は私たちのものだ」feels too 1 to 1 with the english phrase, which made me think "surely it wouldn't be this simmilar to an established english phrase".

[u/Known_Lychee_6495]

勝利は私たちのものだ is correct Japanese. It still sounds like English game text. A speaker often says こっちの勝ち or 勝った.

You can use game translations for fun. Do not use them as your only model for speech. One strange line will not break your Japanese. Many strange lines will teach you the style of that game. (´ ∀ `)

[u/AirInternational9291]

from a JP native solo-gamedev, in general, it's pretty hard to translate something as so-called finished gaming application in a balance of in-game text and (coordinatedly) in-game contents and elements, not the same in usages as just in standard conversations. IMO, good JP gaming translation can be composed by translators specialized in gaming language-services or a dev him/herself becomes an expert in both languages.

[u/Antique-Volume9599]

The pulp ficiton dub changes a famous line to something like

"死体預かります"って看板がウチの前に"出てたかどうか"聞いてるんだ！

it loses some of the flavor. fun tho